US says military killed 12 civilians in 2021, sparking scepticism

The United States Department of Defense, which has for years been accused of vastly under-investigating and under-reporting civilian casualties, has released a congressionally mandated annual report on civilians killed by the US military worldwide in 2021, listing just 12 civilian killings it determined to be “credible”.

The report late on Tuesday renewed perennial scepticism about official US military counts of civilian casualties.

 A previously acknowledged US drone attack that killed 10 family members, including seven children, in Kabul on August 29, 2021, accounted for the majority of civilian deaths confirmed by the Pentagon for the whole of the year. 

US officials have publicly called the attack a “mistake”, but said no personnel would be punished for the incident.